Libertarians are starting to get on my nerves. Rand Paul and his earnest plea to let people have the freedom to die when they can’t afford medical care is just the most immediate example. Paul is essentially saying, “Give me liberty, AND give me death!” What a rallying cry.

Given the bizarre performance of their presidential spoilers during the last “election,” I’d think they’d want to include a mental health option in any healthcare plan. But I digress.

Paul is merely doing what the Republicans always do, which is to come up with plausible-sounding excuses for why we should put the old and the sick on an ice floe and let them drift out to sea. Conveniently, we’ve got one as big as Delaware in the antarctic.

Lying is the essential arrow in the Republican quiver. It’s the very foundation of their economic arguments, which always suggest that by letting a few people become obscenely rich the rest of us will flourish.

The president doesn’t have a clue about–well, anything, including health care, and the Vice President lies with the pseudo-sincerity that religious hypocrites are known for. The Senate is controlled by the drawling destroyer Mitch “sit down and shut up” McConnell, while the House is overseen by a self-described policy wonk and Ayn Rand acolyte who’s a complete fraud.

I don’t know what’s happened to our government, but I do know that letting it decide how to provide health care for the country is going to kill us all.

Here’s a NYT comment that really says what I believe. This belief of mine has been percolating over the past couple years and represents, I suppose, a turn away from the left but it’s still on the left side of the political spectrum. Anyway, here it is:

gumnaam nowhere 14 hours ago

Senator Sanders, much respect to you, but what about the election in France? A center-right candidate walloped the far right candidate. The main difference: the inability of the Russians to interfere.

The Democratic party is a big-tent party, and cannot function well with ideological purity tests. Policies also have to be achievable, which means listening to all stakeholders. The Democratic sweep in 2006-2008 did not come about because of following a rigid ideological prescription. The Democrats will win by being the party of good governance with new talented candidates across the ideological spectrum. It is well past time to stop beating on people on your own side, and start focusing your ire on the real problem: the Republicans.

Reply 196 Recommended

It’s the second paragraph above that really resonates with me. And especially the very last sentence which states the real problem: the Republicans.

The comment comes from an op-ed by Bernie Sanders in the NYT today: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/13/opinion/bernie-sanders-how-democrats-can-stop-losing-elections.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region&region=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region

For a primer on Trump and his takeover of the GOP, read the series of editorials in the LA Times.
http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-ed-our-dishonest-president/
There are six of them, they are as revealing as anything you have read here.

As many of us feared, he was able to appoint a very conservative judge to the Supreme Court. This has damaged our republic for at least another 40 years. But it is not really Trump who has caused this damage, it is the GOP controlled Senate, trump is just a catalyst, he has given the congress the means to carry on the GOP agenda that is a detriment to the citizenry of the U.S.

The GOP has been working to overturn progressive programs since the 1932 election of FDR. Despite their claims, the GOP is opposed to improving the lives and welfare of the citizens, with the convenient argument that it costs too much.This resonates with those who do not have much to start with, and the majority of the wealthy who are just plain greedy.

Read “The People VS Greed: Stealing America” by J.W. Cotchett.

It is why we don’t have universal health care, High Speed Rail, a decline in retirement plans, affordable education. The list goes on, Trump is just a symptom of niggardly policies of the GOP. They do not say so openly, but he is just what they have wanted for the last 85 years.

We have to start by cleaning up congress, Trump has not power without them.

By the way, all you Hillaryhaters, if you are an idealist, remember she was as idealistic as you when she started out, only better at it. She is tarnished by having to work in the real world and make compromises with reality. That doesn’t make her evil. She has a hard core of goodness, and if you give her a Democratic Congress, you will be surprised at how good she can be.

The above advice is taken from a comment by a Susan Anderson from Boston to an op-ed by Lindy West, “Donald and Billy on the Bus” in the NYT on October 9, 2016.

My goal, from now until the election, is to wake from this extended nightmare. There is no other explanation for us to be having this conversation, in which a minor shift in style or tone could put Donald Trump in the Oval Office. In my nightmare, tomorrow’s headline will read, “Trump doesn’t call Hillary a fat old lying cow with scrofula, soars in post-debate polls.”

If he doesn’t praise Putin or insult the mother of a dead soldier, will Trump get points? If Hillary grimaces or coughs or wears an unflattering outfit, will pundits declare her the loser? Is the bar really set so low that candidates must dig their way under it?

Conservatives got us here, having so beaten up our honorable two-party system that Donald Trump seems qualified to carry the Republican banner. They feign embarrassment while they watch Trump exemplify the ignorance, the blatant appeal to wealth and the denial of reality that characterized their game plan from the moment Obama took office.

Most people don’t follow politics all that closely. They see a headline, pick up the tone and talk among themselves. Conservatives commandeered the discourse and made income inequality holy, and healthcare for all an abomination. They rendered many of us stupid and susceptible.

So in a way Trump is your baby, Mr. Brooks, a veritable Rosemary’s baby, the evil spawn of ignorance and innocence. We may have to live with him, but you’ll have to change his diapers.

Here’s a comment this morning by “Reality Based” on Paul Krugman’s article. It about sums up what our problem has been in this country for many years.

Reality Based: Flyover Country

We now have thirty five years of financial/economic history that should have destroyed forever the Great Lie that Voodoo economics creates anything but deficit bubbles, which are then used to attack and destroy social programs for the poor and middle class. Reagan tripled federal deficits in order to cut taxes in half for the wealthy, while weaponry expenditures exploded. Bush One left office with historic deficits and a sinking economy, which Bill Clinton remedied by returning to progressive taxation on high incomes. Every Republican in Congress said it would destroy the economy, and instead we had 20 million new jobs and zero deficits by 2000. Republicans responded with smears and impeachment. Bush2 insisted upon a return to Voodoo Economics combined with huge upper end tax cuts and two wars, which along with a financial de-regulation frenzy re-created the same enormous deficits, which were then used to try and destroy Social Security. This idiocy nearly brought down the world financial system. Obama’s sane economic advisers restored job growth and eliminated most of the deficits, but sixteen Republicans are all ready to return to the same policies that have been failing for a third of a century.

The Republican Party exists to enrich the wealthy, and empower a tiny elite. It has been concentrating income and wealth, by redistributing it upwards for thirty five years. This, of course, is only possible with a politics based totally on deceit, which is the whole point.

It was worth the wait. Obama has rendered the years of Republican obstructionism moot. Their clever ploys of the faux filibuster and the bellicose bullying and the Bibi embarrassments have fallen flat, and while Republicans were patting themselves on the back for their midterm “sweep” of Congress, Obama was planting the seeds for a bumper crop of reforms. Now, in the months preceding the presidential primaries, Obama is reminding people what Democrats stand for.

Republicans, on the other hand, are reaping what they sowed, which is precisely nothing. They’ve doubled-down on the sneering hate-speech and the empty rhetoric that appeals to the slack-jawed, resulting in a three-ring-circus of Republican anti-candidates who must run on negative accomplishments. It’s all about what they closed down, eliminated, blocked, cancelled and squashed. The only thing they built up is the bank accounts of their like-minded multi-millionaire brethren. When Donald Trump is getting buzz, you know the hive is diseased.

Obama has paved the way for a Democratic victory. Nothing is guaranteed, but even a somewhat compromised Hillary Clinton, energized by a we’re-mad-as-hell-and-we’re-not-going-to-take-it-any-more message from Bernie Sanders, gives me reason to hope for change. Come to think of it, that’s what Obama promised all along. He just didn’t say when it would happen. Maybe it’s now.

Here’s a comment predicting the political future given the Republicans’ take over of both branches of congress:

Mary Ann & Ken Bergman Ashland, OR 3 hours ago
Now that Republicans fully control both houses of Congress, the chances increase that they’ll overreach in their zealous fervor to do everything they can to make President Obama a failure. There will be bills passed that they know the President will veto. There will be further blockage of his executive and judiciary appointments. And there will be a raft of Congressional hearings on the “scandals,” real or imagined, of the Obama administration. They may play their game of bluff over the federal budget, even though they’ll likely get the blame if the government is shut down. If certain Republicans have their way, there will be impeachment proceedings, even though Republicans don’t have the necessary two-thirds of the Senate in their pocket. It’s going to be a time of high theater, although little if any legislation is likely to be enacted.

So the President is wise to act, to the extent that he can, to carry out needed actions by executive orders. Unfortunately, they’re likely to be challenged in the courts, effectively tying them up for months or years in the legal process. The Republicans will use every means at their disposal to prevent the Obama administration from moving forward on important issues.

The level of mean-spiritedness of today’s Republicans is likely to become even more apparent to the public and turn them off. But Democrats are not faultless; they need to push progressive programs that help all of us, and stop being “Republican-Lite.”

FlagReply 99Recommend Share this comment on FacebookShare this comment on Twitter

It will be interesting to look at this a year from now and see how things turned out.

Racism won. Obstructionism won. But we’ll see how they do now! Watch for the backlash, GOP! Here’s a good comment by Brian of NYC in the NYT:

“This is the absolute best thing that could have happened. This is the end of the GOP as we know it.

The next two years will see Repubs having to do what they are institutionally against: making government work. Watch. The dog has been chasing the car for so long it no longer has any idea what to do besides bark. This places Democrats in perfect position for 2016. The next two years will be a circus as the extremist GOP agenda will be forced into broad daylight for all to see. Obama’s power of veto will ensure that their social and economic goals won’t take us back to the middle ages, so I’m not worried about them doing any lasting damage.

This isn’t a win for them. This is a short term set-back against progress that will arouse the disgust of the American public. In the meantime, it will be good fun watching them try to throw a ball they’ve spent the past four years trying to deflate.”

The rich and the moneyed corporate interests and the Republicans in their pockets have been quite bold about this: no healthcare for the poor. No education for the poor. And the middle class is weakening and falling away while the ultrarich control more and more.

The truth is, such a society is, overall, a poorer society. What I don’t understand is why some middle class and some poor actually support Republican initiatives that make them poorer and hurt their own health and the education of their children. It is a stunning triumph of propaganda, where some people support policies that hurt them, because of false contrived bogeymen like freeloading illegals and welfare queens. And the entire country is suffering for this propaganda bought and paid for by the rich and the corporations who don’t want to pay for your health and your education. And some of you agree with it! Insanity.

I thought it was “We the people,” not “We the rich people and corporations.” You who are poor and Republican or middle class and Republican: please take note of the war that is being waged against you, and reevaluate your support for policies which only impoverish you, bought and paid for by propaganda mouth pieces that appeal to your irrational fears rather than your sense of reason.